| DOCPAY™ vs Patient Finance Companies |
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| DOCPAY | Patient Finance Companies* |
| With DOCPAY, The Practice Receives FULL PAYMENT! There are no "discount" factors that reduce the amount the doctor receives. Within a week of sending in the DOCPAY authorization form, the doctor has a stack of checks in hand for FULL PAYMENT WITH NO DISCOUNT. The practice then deposits the checks on a month by month basis as agreed upon in the patient payment plan. |
The Practice MAY NOT RECEIVE FULL PAYMENT Some finance company payment plans do offer "No Interest" financing, however, "No Interest" is a bit misleading. In actuality THE DOCTOR IS PAYING THE INTEREST. Depending on the length of the installment plan the doctor may pay up to 9.9% interest for the patient in the form of a "discount" on what he receives from the finance company. In addition, the terms often require that the patient make each and every installment payment on time. Even though they may have paid off the entire debt in the time allotted (because this is what the office manager told them they must do), they are often surprised to find that the fine print in the agreement states that if one single payment is one day late, the entire original balance has interest applied from day one. The interest charged under this penalty clause may be as high as 24.9%! This kind of treatment certainly doesn't engender a positive feeling for the practice that recommended the finance company. |
| NO INTEREST! The patient pays no interest and doesn't even have the cost of mailing a monthly payment. The patient's only cost is a one-time "payment plan convenience fee" of $19.95. |
Usually VERY HIGH INTEREST! Although there are some plans that charge no interest (which are discussed in the next section), most charge exorbitant interest rates. Although the rates vary from company to company, most are over 20%! Once its all paid off, if a patient ends up paying $2000 for a $1000 procedure due to exorbitant interest rates, they'll think twice before having another elective procedure done in your office! |
| NO Dollar Limits DOCPAY payment plans can be for ANY amount. There are no minimums or maximums. |
Minimum & Maximum Dollar Amounts With most Patient Finance Companies, if the patient balance is less than $1000, a payment plan is usually not allowed. The maximum amount allowed is determined upon evaluation of the patient's credit rating. |
| NO Credit Approval Required Any patient that has a checking account qualifies. At DOCPAY, we realize that often you have a better feel for your patient's reliability than some credit screener who has never met them. |
Credit Approval Required Each patient is evaluated on his creditworthiness, which often is not really indicative of their true ability to pay. Many patients have small blemishes in their credit rating that may have occurred years ago, but still remain in their credit history. These will often cause patient finance companies to reject patients who are perfectly capable of making regular payments. Many practices have reported that as many as 50% to 75% of the patients they submit are rejected. These rejections will often result in lost revenue to the practice when the patient elects to not have the work done. |
| Success Determined by Patient's ABILITY to Pay The biggest single problem in getting paid is not the patient's ability to pay but his willingness to consider paying the doctor a priority. Patients tend to procrastinate, thinking, "I'll pay that bill next week. There are other things more important I need to pay this week." DOCPAY removes the problem of procrastination and makes sure that every payment is made on time. |
Success Determined by Patient's WILLINGNESS to Pay Many consumers have the ability to pay their debts but are unwilling to consistently do so. This causes credit ratings to go into a downward spiral. Even though in many cases the consumer CAN pay, he doesn't get around to it. Consumers in this category will often be denied by patient finance companies even though they would have been very successful in paying their debt with DOCPAY. |
| NO Negative Impact on Patient's Credit Rating | Potential Negative Impact on Patient's Credit Rating Consumers with marginal credit are also very wary of turning in another credit card application. They realize that every time they are turned down by a credit card company, the turndown remains on their credit history as a derogatory item for many years. Even though the consumer may have the ability to pay and might have been approved, they hesitate to take the risk of further messing up their credit rating. Savvy consumers have also learned that each time they open a new credit account, the total amount of credit available to them across all their accounts is increased. Bank loan officers then see this as a liability and reject loan applicants that have a large amount of unused available credit. They realize all too well that consumers with this condition can easily over-extend themselves and no longer have the ability to pay on all their debt. |
| DOCPAY is Simple, Quick & Easy to Set Up with the Patient. There is very little paperwork involved. You just explain the concept that the payments are automatically withdrawn from the account, have them sign an authorization form, and fax it to DOCPAY. Within a week you'll receive a stack of pre-authorized checks for the entire payment plan. |
Patient Finance Companies Require A Full Credit Application To Be Completed and Approved. An intimidating application must be completed. Then the application must be sent in and the practice must wait for approval. |
| Reduces Financial Risk Since payments are automatic, the patient would have to go to extraordinary measures in order to NOT pay. |
Does Not Reduce Financial Risk Finance Companies tend to only approve patients with exceptionally good credit. This means that risk is NOT being reduced because those patients would have paid anyway! |
| Patient Acceptance is High Patients have become accustomed to the concept of automatic withdrawals against their account. Many already pay for their life insurance or health club memberships with this method and are familiar with both the concept and its convenience. |
Patients Are Reluctant to Borrow Money With a patient finance plan, the patient is actually borrowing money. This is a debt that must go on their financial statement. |
| Flexibility If the patient knows that there will not be enough money in their bank account when the monthly check is deposited, they have the flexibility of calling the practice and asking that the payment be held for a few days. Since the payments are at the doctor's office, the office has the ability to provide the patient with this type of flexibility. |
No flexibility Payments are due the same day every month, regardless of whether the patient can make them or not. Consequently, many of the patients do not make all payments on schedule and end up paying substantial penalties and interest. |
| No Surprises Later There is no question as to who is ultimately responsible for the debt. It is the patient who must pay. |
Recourse Many of the patient finance companies have fine print in their contracts that make the practice ultimately responsible for the debt should the patient not pay. |
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